Reven snorted a laugh. “Uhm… ok, well, when we get to Avir, we’ll find you new ones that you do like.”
“I do not like any of them,” she insisted. He glanced at her, watched her scratch at the tunic as if wanting to strip that off as well, and finally understood. When she’d been found, she was naked. If that was all she knew, he could see how clothing would be restrictive and uncomfortable.
“Fair enough,” he said, happy for the few words so far. “Were you born in Kalaegh?”
She looked at him but shook her head. He nodded. He had nothing left to ask without feeling like a busy body, so he sat beside her in silence. He squinted when she brought her hand up to eye level, creating a fog that projected an image, almost like a map. Reven felt his mouth drop. It was a spell he had never seen before. He could clearly see the land masses and seas, oceans, mountains, rivers - except none of them were right. She pointed at a land mass in the east, somewhere that looked vaguely similar to where Vinlaine might be now.
“There?” he asked. “That’s where you were born?”
She nodded. He squinted at the map, the land masses and seas oddly familiar to him even if they were wrong. His eyes nearly bulged when he realized why.
Liam, for all his insanities and quirks, loved maps. He had a map for every nation. He claimed it was good business sense, knowing where one was going, but he also had maps that were ancient, that showed lands that no longer existed or borders that changed over time. This map, in particular, Reven had seen on a few occasions, when Liam felt like proving his intelligence. It was a map of the world prior to the Destruction, a great cataclysmic event that nearly tore the whole of Doranelle apart. It was an event that happened more than three thousand years gone.
“That’s… impossible…” Reven snorted, looking at Serai. She remained silent, placid, and entirely unwavering in her mute answer. “But that means…you’d…”
Reven did not finish the sentence. He couldn’t. The olve were long-lived but they weren’t that long- lived. No one was. And she certainly did not appear olven. The map eventually faded away, her palm closing so she could tuck it back into herself. The bard scratched his head, frowning in thought, but decided that she must be mistaken. Perhaps she didn’t remember much either. The gods knew he could barely remember the last five years, let alone anything else.
“Well…” the bard continued, needing to find something rational to hold on to. “What about your family then?”
“Malek,” she answered simply. The drake was her family; of course he was. “Liam is yours.”
“My family? After a fashion, I suppose. I don’t remember my family, and I don’t have a Malek,” Reven answered. He glanced at her, this girl that did not like clothing and was born in a land that was three thousand years gone. She was not beautiful like some women, but had a radiance about her that was alluring. And her eyes… a man could lose himself in those eyes.
He cleared his throat and crawled back to his pile of blankets. She watched him then followed. Reven opened his mouth to stop her, to tell her she did not have to follow, but thought better of it and shut his mouth. It would not be the first time they had slept in each other’s company. She curled up beside him, her back pressed against his side.
“Are you really three thousand years old?” Reven asked after a few moments of silence. His voice was pitched low, almost inaudible as if he’d been afraid to ask. She did not immediately answer but finally nodded and said very quietly ‘yes’.
***
By morning the conversation with Serai had completely left the bard’s mind. He woke with a groan. His bones ached, his leg especially, and his arm tingled uncomfortably. The banging on the door did not help matters, Liam’s voice following with demands to come up to the deck and stop loafing about. There was nothing to be done on the speck of a ship they traveled on except stare at the fish.
Serai was no longer beside him, so the creaky bard forced himself to his feet and shuffled up to where Liam waited. He was still too bleary-eyed for the sudden caustic brightness of the sun, and squinted and raised a hand to blot out the light trying to blind him.
“She’s causin’ a scene,” Liam said as soon as Reven finished his shuffle over to the thief-taker.
“Who is?”
“Yer cave woman,” Liam said, pointing to where Serai was. She was bent over the railing, naked as the day they found her, arms reaching for something in the water below. Reven could only blink. The crew watched admiringly, all of them smirking and making lude gestures. Reven only palmed his face, grabbing the first thing he could find that might act as a cover.
“Is Ajana up yet?” Reven asked, walking toward Serai.
“No, she needs the rest,” Liam answered, arms folded across his chest. He could have done something, but put the responsibility of Serai solely on Reven’s shoulders. He’d wanted to leave her behind. Ajana and Reven had both argued to bring her along lest she be sold or worse. Reven only shook his head, walking up behind Serai with a wool blanket in his hands. He draped it around her, surprising her some. She stood up, turning right into him, looking at the wool with disgust.
“You can’t be up here without clothes,” he explained, wrapping her up. “We can fish after we find you something to wear, all right?”
“I do not like clothes,” she argued, pouting as he pushed her back down below deck. He glared at anyone that dared to comment, the crew going back to their duties with grumbles of disappointment.
“I know, but you can’t …
